Despite the banter you hear from Fox News commentators such as Neil Cavuto, Bill O’Reilly and, formerly, Glenn Beck, members of the Republican Party are not so different from their Democratic counterparts. They are just as, if not more, interested in helping along the private, economic ambitions people harbor.

Government, regardless of what tea party politicians or Keynesian economists say, does not exist so that nearly full employment can be the norm. Government does not exist so you can keep most of your paycheck. Government does not exist for these purposes in the same way that it does not exist to redistribute wealth or to punish profits.

We have government because there are certain activities whose performance either requires the presence of others or brings us into contact with others, and those activities should be regulated.

Those activities, which are by definition public not private, should be regulated.

Even the framers of our Constitution said so. Writing “Federalist No. 15,” Alexander Hamilton asked, “Why has government been instituted at all?” He offered us an answer to his question, saying that government existed “Because the passions of men will not conform to the dictates of reason and justice, without constraint.” If you’re not satisfied with Hamilton’s reason, try that of another man.

Robert Yates, an anti-federalist (so, opposite Hamilton in the constitutional ratification debates), wrote in favor of a bill of rights and contrasted a state of nature with civil society. He wrote that, since individuals in a state of nature oppress and violate one another if they are able to do so, “It is therefore proper that bounds should be set to their authority, as that government should have at first been instituted to restrain private injuries.” In other words, government and the freewheeling state of nature are directly opposed to one another, even in the anti-federalist view.

My columnists, Editorial Board, editor colleagues and myself are often labeled as the “lefty editors of the Daily.” But at least we admit that, more often than not, our personal political opinions are more liberal than conservative or more left than right. Republicans, on the other hand, grossly deny their support for policies that benefit peoples’ private particular lives instead of improving the world in which we live.

Speaker of the House John Boehner (R-OH) may kick, scream and jump up and down all day and night about passing tax cuts, deregulating financial and energy sectors of the economy, reducing the deficit and debt, and creating more jobs for the American economy.

When did we return to the ancient and medieval assumption that the power of law is supposed to benefit special classes of individuals? Ours would be the freest country in the world — freer than it is even now or ever was — if we held to things like the 14th Amendment’s Equal Protection Clause instead of applying it only to matters of prejudice. Or if we took the founders’ vision for the Constitution seriously and only made laws and interpreted constitutional powers for the general or common good, not that of particular pieces of the country.

And that misunderstanding will kill every standard of decency that we haven’t already cast to the winds in favor of profits, easy money, convenience and Lucullan decadence.

Economic health may lead to a more peaceful or orderly society. But fat and lazy cats, who eat well and enjoy every conceivable modern convenience, are the cats least likely to wake up and start chasing the mice that run through the house devouring anything they can lay their hands on.

For all their talk of the founding fathers and the first generation of Americans, Republicans have forgotten their dislike for sumptuous luxury and preference for moderation and self-restraint. The anti-federalists’ preference for rural, traditional, “republican” values stemmed from their hesitancy to believe that virtue, thinking beyond one’s own self, could exist in a city where individuals and money are concentrated in close proximity.

The whole reason we have our Constitution (so often invoked by Republicans) — the whole reason we have our government — is to enact solutions to our problems. The Founding Fathers Republicans invoke ditched the Articles of Confederation precisely because they granted inadequate powers to the national government.

If a situation, crisis or condition is changing the way we interact with and treat one another, then under our Constitution we are empowered to legislate about it.